Picking up from the last post, I took the girls shopping on Wednesday. They enjoyed themselves and were well behaved. They were both riding in the basket of the cart. All went well until both decided to reach for a 'Wall-E' pillow case hanging at the end of an aisle. I was standing next to the cart at the time, and it tipped onto me! B was unharmed, Evelyn (as you can imagine) had a very dramatic reaction to the incident. She got a scrape on her ribs and a bruise on her knee. I have a large, deep bruise on my calf and ankle. I did not realize that carts could tip so easily! I thought the warnings to keep kids seated were to keep them from falling out when the cart moved. As we were still, I was not really thinking about them falling out. So, we all learned a good lesson! NO standing in a cart - EVER!
J seemed to be having a prolonged, and difficult time with his belly. He had a lot of gas, and was fussy for much of the time we were there. This meant that K-A was up with him most nights. As you can imagine, she was pretty tired.
I watched all the kids after bed on Wednesday while K-A and K went out on a little date. The first since J was born. Then, the next night, K-A and I quickly went to Value Village before it closed, then out for tea.
On Thursday, we went to Jungle Mania. The kids really enjoyed themselves and played hard for a couple hours. After, we took them to a cafe for lunch. They were all very well behaved. Evelyn's favorite part of JM was the twisty slide. She loved that a motion sensitive bird would start chirping and flapping it's wings whenever a child went down the slide.
As usual, Evelyn made several 'friends' while at JM. She makes friends very easily. When it was time to go, I told my kids 'first one out gets a Jelly Bean' and ALL the kids in the gym all sped for the exit! I ended up awarding the jelly bean to one of Evelyn's new friends. He won the race!
Mediating the interactions of 4 kids, and trying to keep my own exuberant kids quiet during the day so others could sleep was pretty stressful. I enjoyed the visit, but I can still feel that I'm holding my shoulders up near my ears!
To top off the stress, the Kelowna airport does not have luggage carts for free. You need a loonie or 4 quarters to free the cart from the holding pen. Why they do this, I have NO idea. I would not have minded, if they had a credit card reader or something. But, they don't. So, one of the visitor info staff was able to get me a cart on our arrival, but when we left, I had 2 quarters and 3 dimes in my wallet. I used my loonie on tea the night before! I mentioned my dilemma to one of the car rental guys, hoping he might help me lug 2 kids, 2 bags, 2 car seats, and 3 carry on bags the 100 metres to the terminal. I had just spent a chunk of money renting from his company... I think he needed a direct request, because my STRONG hint did not seem to sink in. So, I was essentially stranded until a kind, fellow traveller offered to carry the carseats. I was very thankful for him! Had it been anywhere else, where any unattended bag would not be considered a bomb, I would have just left a couple bags in sight and made 2 trips in stages until I reached the check in counter. That strategy would not work in an airport! So, whoever you are, thank you to my travelling helper! Failing grades to the customer service at Budget car rentals in Kelowna. I think I will be sending some constructive criticism to both the Kelowna airport and Budget Rentals.
My story does not end here. We needed to eat before the flight, and once past security, the only food is at a sit down White Spot. The meal was good, I spilled my pop all over the table, and as we finished the meal, both kids had to go to the bathroom. So, I rushed paying the cheque, and as we headed to the bathroom, the boarding call for our flight was announced. This would have been fine, except that Evelyn was expecting to be able to play on the little gym for a few minutes. Plans had to change, we needed to board! ... She did not take the change in plans well.
Imagine, if you will, a long line of passengers, all waiting to board. They are tired, weary, bored, and probably hoping to have a quiet, 55 min flight to Edmonton. Just as pre boarding ends, they see Evelyn, running toward them, SCREAMING at the top of her lungs, tears of rage streaming down her cheeks followed by her little brother and frazzled Mom. She is crying about anything and everything that she can reasonably protest. "I don't want to go on the plane. I don't want my ears to pop. I want to play on the playground...."
What would be going through your mind as a potential travel mate of this banshee?
There was very little build up to this tirade. Almost no warning for me to try to avert this scene. Now, I'm stuck in a very embarassing situation with few options. On trying to calm her by kneeling next to her, she pushed me over. Then, as I was getting up off the floor, she shoved Ethan down too. I gathered them, and our stuff, and headed to the bathroom. It took about 5-10 min to calm her down. I had her repeat "God has given me a spirit of self control" "I will control myself" "I will obey" "I will be calm". She apologized to me for pushing and being disrespectful, and to Ethan for being unkind and pushing. We gathered our stuff and headed to the gate.
We were the last people to board. The attendant at the gate asked "Are you the Mom that had to visit the bathroom?" What a diplomatic way to ask if these were the kids who caused such a big disruption! "Yes, that's us. I think we are under control now" was my reply.
The flight went well. At the end, a woman stopped to tell me I handled Evelyn's melt-down well. That was nice of her! It made me feel a bit better about the whole event. We waited for everyone to deplane before us. Ethan had pooped, so we stopped to change him. The kids dawdled in the exit and set off a motion alarm (you are not allowed to linger in that area). When we reached the bag carousel, it had stopped moving. Everyone was gone. I guess we took too long! It worked out okay though, because Westjet had collected all our stuff and had it waiting on a luggage cart at the bag counter (a free of charge cart - like most airports have...) and ready to go.
We stopped at Costco in Edmonton and arrived home around 8 pm. Whew! I'm not sure if I'm up to travelling with 2 kids on my own again. At least not when I have to lug car seats around too. Overall, they listened well. On the plane, they were very well behaved. Both seemed to like the take off and landing. We all enjoyed seeing the mountians. Maybe in a few more days, my shoulders will loosen enough for me to have a neck again!
I got the pleasure of watching Evelyn dance a couple weeks ago (It's taking me a while to get a chance to blog stuff) They did better than when we watched in the fall. Ethan was especially excited to be able to go to dance class. He counted down the days and SO wanted to participate. He had a really difficult time sitting and watching. Much of the recital was spent with him in the foyer repeating with him "I have been given a spirit of self-control" "I will control myself" "I will sit quietly". Then, we'd return for about 5 min before his desire to participate became too much to bear again and out we'd go. I let him join in for the last 5 minutes and he really enjoyed himself.
Evelyn put a lot of effort into her movements, but needs to work on following the teacher :-) She spent about 5 minutes sitting on the floor, spinning around and around. One of her favorite part was playing "What time is it Mr.Wolf?" with the favorite 'time' being "Lunch Time". I'm glad she enjoys herself. I think they will both take the class next year.
